


If Only in my Dreams

by jat_sapphire



Series: I'll Be Home for Christmas [3]
Category: The Professionals (TV 1977)
Genre: Episode: s04e06 Discovered in a Graveyard, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-15
Packaged: 2021-03-13 08:40:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 10,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28775472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jat_sapphire/pseuds/jat_sapphire
Summary: Almost a year after Doyle reconciled (basically) with his mother, in 1982, he is shot by Mai Li.  Bodie tells Mrs Doyle what has happened and she comes to the hospital while Ray is in a coma.  As was dramatised in "Discovered in a Graveyard," Ray dreams while he is unconscious.
Relationships: William Bodie/Ray Doyle
Series: I'll Be Home for Christmas [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2102805
Comments: 8
Kudos: 19





	1. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mai Li shoots Ray and Bodie can hardly bear it.

1982

The night before the shooting, Bodie lay splayed across Ray's bed, feeling as if he was hardly tethered to the earth, as if, should he let go of the bedclothes beneath him, he'd drift off into space.

He lifted one hand languidly, to brush Ray's bicep, hard and hot and damp, up to the curve of his shoulder, the taut cords of his neck. Wet love-locks tangled at the ends of his fingers. Ray grinned fiercely, mouthing Bodie's collar-bone, his nipple, and the edges of his pectoral, licking where Bodie's sweat lay slick. "Ray," he said, feeling as if he was surrounded, engulfed in Ray.

"You're perfect," Ray whispered, and nibbled Bodie's ribs. He kissed where the dark curls of pubic hair began and took Bodie's straining cock in his mouth, tongue and lips and fingers toying with Bodie's most sensitive skin.

Bodie's power, his fire, rose throughout his body, growing, climbing. He held on to Ray as if he might be flung away, take off like a rocket. Bodie gritted his teeth in a grin, closing his eyes as tightly as he could. Ray sucked and pushed against Bodie, humming as if Bodie were a musical instrument and Ray were a musician, a flautist, or perhaps a pianist with those slim fingers. Ray bucked and his voice rose, no words but passion in his voice, sounding like a man who had wanted Bodie for years, even before they had met. And Bodie knew it was true.

He felt the gush of Ray's orgasm and tipped over himself, so full of unbridled happiness that he had no energy left for anything but smiling. Ray squirmed up in reach of Bodie's face, kissing him again and again, curled around his lax legs and relaxed torso, his head on Bodie's shoulder and his curls soft and sleepy.

Next day was the court date for the young bombers who had blown themselves up and won Ray's sympathy by their reluctance to kill a porter, even though they were in a van full of explosives. Their deaths seemed only to be expected, to Bodie, but Ray wouldn't even come for a pint, saying he had errands to run, and Bodie knew that Ray actually was out of milk and clean pants.

But the pint was no fun without Ray. The dart board was scarred and some of the the darts bent. The barmaid was middle-aged and not very friendly. The food was dull. Bodie went out to his car and drove nearly to Ray's, got out to buy a paper before walking to the flat-block, and on his way to drop the paper in the front seat heard the R/T go off, a security alert on Ray's flat, and Bodie couldn't wait to walk or run, just told HQ he was on his way and fired off in the car. He scaled the fire-escape and the edge of the balcony as fast as he could. There was Ray on the floor, full of palm-sized shards of glass and bullets, the rug under him all milk and blood. 

Bodie was rigid in the ambulance. All he could feel was an unholy mixture of rage and terror. He needed to come to grips with Ray's assassin as he needed to breathe. Ray's eyes were warm, trying to comfort Bodie even as his face was swallowed up in the oxygen mask, and his fingers flexed weakly while Bodie shouted "Who was it?" over and over. The orderlies got Ray on a gurney and rushed him into surgery, and Bodie stalked behind like a devil in chains. He yelled at the doctors, the nurses, everyone until Cowley arrived and dragged Bodie to Ray's flat. Malone and his crew were on the job already. There was a faint scent of the two of them in the unmade bed, though thank goodness none of Bodie's clothes were in evidence. Cowley left Bodie there to search the flat ... as a third wheel, Bodie would have said. 

Back in hospital, he stood beside Cowley in the gallery of the operating theatre and felt like a sponge squeezed dry, a can empty of lager, a takeaway container without a thread of pasta left in it. He might as well be the dead one, and Doyle-- _oh, **Ray**_ \--would be investigating Bodie's murder while ghost-Bodie blew away on the wind.

At last, Ray gave him the clue even as he lay wired up and intubated, the twist of his finger in the air reminding Bodie of that terrarium and the snake ring that Chinese bird had made and Ray had bought. 

Back in Lin Fo's hotel, he found her. She shot Lin Fo in his hotel room, was shot herself and left on the embassy doorstep like rubbish. Even Bodie felt bad for her, discarded by her political enemies, and that smug-voiced functionary talking about her martyrdom as if Bodie would care. Or even Cowley.

As Bodie watched her loaded into the ambulance, he thought of Ray, of the end of the year ... and of Ray's mother. He expected Cowley to send him with the news, so it was no surprise when, even after their argument about whose blame the whole debacle was, Cowley gave him a grudging half-day to go get Mrs Doyle.

Not surprising, just terrible, recalling Tony Miller's mother and the relatives at CI5 funerals, the dumb pain in their eyes and the dabs of their handkerchiefs to catch tears and running noses, choking sounds during the service, all of which had seemed comfortably distant before.

Now their pain echoed all through his body, heavy in his head and his chest, eyes stinging. Bodie's shoulders pulled down as if he were carrying Ray's whole weight on his shoulders. He reminded himself that Ray was not dead. Not awake, not well, but with air and medicine pumping into him and doctors and nurses flocking around him.

He pulled up Litchurch Street and gazed at the front door and the cabbages for a moment before he got out. He hadn't expected to see it again like this. Alone. He knocked at the door and hoped he'd be let in.

She seemed as suspicious as she had been last year, as if even young men she knew frightened her. Or perhaps she didn't remember him. "Hello, Mrs Doyle," he said, ingratiatingly. "My name is Bodie, remember me from last year? Ray's partner? May I come in?"

She stepped back, silently, and he came in and stood near the loveseat in the sitting room.

"Sit down, then," she said.

The loveseat was lower than Bodie remembered, and his knees stuck up. He rubbed them nervously. "I have bad news for you, Mrs Doyle."

She was so still that he could not tell if she were breathing at all. She sat, slowly, in the armchair they had moved the year before to put up the tree. "Is he dead?" she asked at last.

"No!" Bodie said, his own fear harsh in his throat. "We were working a case, and one of the people we were investigating followed Ray home, broke into his flat, and shot him. I found him--" he swallowed, tried to ignore the smell of dairy and iron in the air, and went on. "He was in surgery, and they got out the bullets and the glass--he was carrying milk bottles--but he's in a coma now. Mr Cowley sent me to tell you and to bring you to him." 

She did not speak. Bodie felt frozen in place, remembering the stark, heartbreaking sound of Ray's voice saying, " _I was sixteen. On the street._ " She looked as if she remembered too ... something, anyway. A few more seconds went by, and then she stood, abruptly. "I must get my bag," she said, and stumped off up the front stairs.

Bodie took a deep breath. He thought about Ray on his back in the hospital bed, with a tube up his nose and another down his throat, machines on both sides, yards of bandage around his chest, over his shoulder, half a shroud worth. His eyes closed. At least they'd cleaned him up, the scrape on his chin and the blood there. He lay so still. Bodie swallowed hard, remembering Ray bending over him, smiling and mouthing Bodie's neck, anywhere on his skin. No blood then except what rushed through their veins and coloured their cheeks.

Bodie drove. Mrs Doyle sat still and silent, looking left at the other side of the street, the side of the motorway. Suddenly she fished a handkerchief from her handbag and pressed it to her eyes.

Bodie didn't know what to say. There was no comfort for either of them right now. Perhaps never. It was tying Bodie's intestines in knots to think that, for all they knew, Ray might be dead already or dying now, the doctors trying to shock his heart into beating again as they had already needed to do while Ray was in surgery.

He almost didn't recognize her voice when she spoke, fumblingly, as if in a language she barely knew. "Does he have ... a girlfriend?"

"Dozens," said Bodie without thinking.

Then he did think. Ray and he had been lovers for not quite a year--New Year's to now, eleven months and a bit--and they had not told anyone although probably some of CI5 knew. Cowley. Ross. Maybe Murphy or Macklin. There was gossip around HQ. They hadn't cared enough about the rumours to confirm or deny them. The birds they used to wine and dine and bed--none of them would know unless they compared notes that now they were all only wined and dined.

Perhaps Betty could check Ray's file, find out who of Ray's birds had had the most recent security check. Bodie's mouth set firmly. Or one of the CI5 women could cover for them ... Liz? Betty? But it was a lot to ask, and when Ray woke, how could Bodie explain it? And how would Ray respond?

"None serious," he said. That was true, at any rate.

Her lips pressed together as if she did not want to speak. Then she did. "But you two are serious."

Bodie chewed his lip a little, swallowed, and spoke. "You know, Mrs Doyle, I've done a lot of dangerous work. I fought as a mercenary, fought with British Paras and jumped out of airplanes, then with SAS. But CI5 is more dangerous than any of that. At first, when Mr Cowley said I would need a partner, I thought, how much chancier can this be? Then we trained harder than I ever had before. And when we started in earnest, I thought we might not survive the first day. And then maybe not the second day. By the end of the week, Ray had saved my life. Then I saved his. Any given day, if it takes me half a second too long to find where he is or know where he'll jump, then one or both of us will be dead. Yes, I am serious, and so is Ray. A girl may be fun or make us think of the long term, but a partner--Ray--keeps me breathing. And I save him. Nothing is more serious than that."

She said nothing, looking out the wind-screen, but she sighed, and Bodie thought she might understand. After a longer period of silence than Bodie liked, he said, "When Ray was a boy, did he love motorbikes like he does now?"

"Yes. When he first could run, he'd make engine noises and pretend he was a bike. Then he used his hands as if he was grasping handlebars. He drew motorbikes on every piece of paper he handled--his schoolteachers showed me every term. He begged Father Christmas for one, and saved every penny he could earn--then. He took the cash with him, I suppose."

"When he left," Bodie could not refrain from saying.

She nodded silently.

Bodie drove. He pictured Ray on the bus stop, holding his duffel, in a cone of light. Knowing Ray, he'd be weeping, wiping his eyes with his sleeve, even his hair limp with despair.

"Where did he go?" she asked.

_Didn't care then, did you?_ Bodie thought viciously. But he didn't want to fight. "Dunno," he said shortly. "Ask him when he wakes up."

Night had fallen by the time they were in London. They checked Mrs Doyle into the hotel closest to the hospital and ordered tea and chicken sandwiches to be sent up to her room. Bodie waited in the lobby. If she had asked them to stay on Christmas Eve, last year, he would have been happy to help the two Doyles keep the peace and get a bite to eat, but now he wanted to see Ray as soon as he could and to avoid letting out his anger on Ray's behalf. Being caught wanking was an embarrassment, not a crime. It was one thing to run away, as he had done himself, and another thing altogether for a _mother_ to throw out a boy who had nothing but a kid's savings in his pocket. It was a wonder that Ray hadn't ended up working the streets, hooked on drugs, instead of joining the coppers and developing the strictest ethical code that Bodie had ever known next to Cowley's.

Mrs Doyle emerged from her room in only a few minutes. Normally, Bodie would have fussed a bit to make sure she had eaten enough, but resentment on Ray's behalf rose in his throat and he just held open the front door and the passenger door of the Capri.

Ray was as Bodie had left him, in a darkened room with tubes taped into nose and mouth. His heart and brain monitors beeped every second. Bodie brought a chair and set it nearest Ray's head. Mrs Doyle sat in it. She didn't take Ray's hand or reach toward him. She didn't speak. Bodie filled his eyes with Ray and watched his chest rise and fall for a few minutes, and then he stepped out into the hallway to let Cowley know they'd arrived. A nurse came in to update the charts, and Mrs Doyle asked for directions to the W.C. While she was gone, Bodie carefully smoothed Ray's forehead and bent to speak in his ear. "I'm here, Goldilocks," he murmured, "and your mum as well." He kissed Ray's forehead and stepped back just as Mrs Doyle came back.

Both Ray and Bodie hated hospitals, even though they both ended up there much too often. The smells of cleaners and medicine--and, Bodie thought, pain--were inescapable, and when Ray was unconscious, Bodie felt as if ants were crawling under his skin. He remembered Cowley asking how strong Ray's will was and saying that he had to decide whether he wanted to live. Bodie couldn't believe that Ray didn't want to be alive, living with him, Bodie, sleeping together and working together and smelling England's roses and lavender. He excused himself in a mumble and went to pace the corridors and flirt halfheartedly with the nurses.

Back in Ray's room, Bodie wished he had brought in his newspaper, though he supposed he could hardly have read it under Mrs Doyle's eye.

Another nurse updated the charts, and told them it was after 10 pm. Mrs Doyle moved her shoulders as if they were stiff and said, "I'd like to go sleep now." So Bodie took her back to the hotel.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bodie and Ray's mother keep watching over Ray's coma, late at night and the second day.

He went back to hospital. The glaring lights in the hallway, the hushed voices of the nurses, the dimness in Ray's room despite the lights at his bed, made his danger seem more acute. Bodie felt he needed to bear witness to his breathing and his heart beating.

Also, he wanted to be with Ray when his mother was not watching them. He stood at the bed, on the side where Ray's mother had sat, and touched the curly hair lightly, then running the tips of his fingers along the slack, warm skin of Ray's hairline.

"Love," he said, and now his fingertips went down Ray's cheek to his lips, resting beside the tube, feeling the soft skin's dry wrinkles, wanting deeply, fiercely to taste his lover and to feel Ray's tongue on his own. "Christ, mate, don't leave me, come back. You know I need you."

The EKG beeped. The air pump compressed and rose and compressed again. Ray did not move.

In the end, Bodie slipped away to lie in his own bed, in his flat, staring into the dark. Ray had to live. He had to _want_ to live. They had each other to live for, didn't they? How would Bodie go on if Ray ... left? After Bodie's years roaming the earth, flying and driving and even walking, it surprised him that now the whole world had shrunk to one narrow hospital bed and the still body in it. In his solitary sheets, Bodie groaned at the memory of Ray's lean legs, his arms, his sweet bum, stretched out against his own skin.

He woke the next morning before the alarm, so he must have slept eventually, though he didn't know when it was. Before dawn. He got up, showered, dressed and drove to the hotel to meet Mrs Doyle. They breakfasted together. She didn't eat much, any more than Doyle would have done. That gave Bodie something to talk about, at least: Ray's near-vegetarianism and his worry about Bodie's cholesterol and fat intake. "Mind you, he can eat chips and vinegar with the best of them, or fried chicken from a takeaway," he said while Mrs Doyle nibbled toast and sipped her tea.

At the hospital, Mr Seigel stopped at the room to search the pockets of his white coat as if Ray's future could be found there. "His brain is active, very. As if he's going over something, turning it over in his mind. Mr Cowley thought he was trying to decide whether he wants to live."

"Of course he does!" said Bodie. Mrs Doyle gave a small choke and dropped into the same plastic chair she had occupied yesterday.

Mr Seigel spoke encouragingly. "Remind him. Remind him of the things he loves, the reasons to go on. Talk to him. He can hear you."

"What can we talk about, while he's lying there like a log?" Bodie was beginning to feel angry, as helplessness always made him.

"Anything. Everything. The sound of your voice will reassure him because he'll know you're there. Talk about things you do every day. Where you get a pint, where you go on a day off. What he does at work."

"I'd like to hear that, too," said Mrs Doyle.

Bodie thought of several ops that were too classified to tell. Surely there was something, though. The pubs they favored. Darts matches. The barmaid at the Crown--well, no, not chat about tits and arse.

Seigel left. Bodie brought a chair to the other side of the bed. He wanted to take Ray's hand. "Well, mate, guess we're supposed to talk to you. Doctor says you need reminding why you should stick around." Embarrassingly, his voice cracked a little on the last words. He swallowed and tried again. "Your mum's here. I brought her." Mrs Doyle stirred a little, refolded her hands and cleared her throat. Bodie stopped, but she didn't speak.

"Malone and his team went through your flat," Bodie went on, remembering how the walls had seemed to press against him. "Dug a slug out of the walls, seems Mai Li had contact with that crew in Belgium, remember that shooting? Same gun. What a thing, eh? She acted like an unconnected amateur, but I suppose we could have linked those students up. Might still, after we hit the files." Bodie grimaced. "You know how I enjoy that. Lucas and McCabe are on it now, backtracking the van and doing an obbo on that journalist. Better them than us." Bodie almost yawned at the dullness of his own speech. "Might as well read you cricket results, eh? Your Oldham Athletics's doing all right at footer, though, 3 to 1 against Grimsby Town and 3 to 2 with Leyton Orient. If you wake up, maybe we can get a telly in here and see the match with Blackburn Rovers on Boxing Day, shall we?"

Ray, of course, did not reply.

"Remember that match we went to, Oldham versus Stockport? Those fans were mad. I liked the food, know you didn't. They were good seats, though for a while I wasn't sure we'd get out. We took the bikes, didn't we? Good notion. Much easier with all that traffic. Your Norton just flew along. Like that day against King Billy. Remember the mud and that bird of yours, Sally? And Cheryl. That long hair, red as a carnation, never saw anything like it. Hope she's OK. I haven't heard a peep from her since." Bodie swallowed. "I know you were angry. Was glad you were there, though, when Cowley almost topped me. Reckon you saved me bacon."

"Isn't Cowley your boss?" asked Mrs Doyle.

"Yes, controller of CI5. An old mate of mine came up against this biker gang, stomped to death. Got right up me nose. I reckoned I'd take down the leader, any road. Took Ray and Sally to a biker meet where they had a race and a challenge called the Widowmaker. Ray won the race and I took the challenge. Then there was a brawl in the woods and I ended up with King Billy's neck--well, ready to break. Cowley told me to stop and encouraged me with his handgun to my head."

"What did Ray do?"

"I tried to warn him off with a stick the size of two of me fingers, but he got right back up and pulled a biker off me back while I fought Billy. It was him as much as Cowley's pistol that made me stop and think there at the end. I asked him afterward whether he thought Cowley would've shot me and he thought so. Cowley says that CI5 cleans its own doorstep. We've seen him kill more than one bloke he thought was a traitor."

Bodie fixed his gaze on Ray's hand. It twitched a little. "Come on, Ray," he said softly.

"Does he still see this ... Sally, you said?"

Bodie shook his head. "Wasn't the sort of day she'd had planned. The race was one thing, the other girl and the Widowmaker were another. CI5, Cowley, and the police weren't her sort of thing either. Ray took her home and she told him to leave her be."

Mrs Doyle absorbed this. "Does that happen often?"

"Quite a lot. We get called out at all hours. We've left dates at restaurants, walked out of shows, picked up dates and then had to get them a taxi ride home. Once Ray had a special girlfriend--he was serious about her, but she was the daughter of a bloke we were investigating. He came in to be questioned, and she waltzed into Headquarters. Still don't know how that happened. She heard enough to decide Ray didn't trust her. It wasn't that, but she didn't listen. She threw him over in the car park. Poor sod was flattened."

"He didn't go after her?"

"She had a car. He was on foot. She went overseas on business the next day. He moved flats while she was supposed to be gone, never heard from her again."

"You took care of him?"

"Best I could. Took him to a pub, to his flat afterward. Next time we had a couple of days off, we went out to the countryside, went fishing, stayed at a local pub, had cream teas in a twee little tea-shop. Home-made jam and _lovely_ crumpets." Bodie licked his lips reminiscently. Mrs Doyle grinned, showing teeth, and her brows rose over her nose. Bodie grinned back at her. "You look just like Ray when you do that," he said.

She answered, "His father always said he was my image."

Bodie looked closely at her. "Your hair was curly like his, too, wasn't it? Yes, I see it. Before his cheek was broken, he must've been a little cherub." He looked fondly at Ray and listened to the respirator for a minute or so. The EKG beeped. Bodie got to his feet and looked apologetic. "Need to take a walk," he said. His fingers dropped to Ray's wrist. "Don't go anywhere," he said, the humour in his voice not quite masking the concern.

He went out. The nurse came in to update the charts just then, so he heard Mrs Doyle ask for a cup of tea, and the nurse promised to bring one. She also brought a newspaper, which Mrs Doyle flipped through. Bodie had seen it. There was a story about the mystery illness that had killed an openly gay man in a London hospital only a few days before. A new disease. Among gay men. 

Mrs Doyle turned her head and looked at her son, lying as if already dead but for the respirator and the EKG. But there was no mystery about what threatened his life ... just gunshot wounds, which it seemed he could have gotten any day. From Mr Cowley, even.

She wished Mr Cowley were here now. She wanted to ask whether he considered homosexuality treacherous. What the true state of affairs was between Bodie and Ray. What CI5's attitude was toward this new illness. Whether he could give her any assurances about her son's safety, if he woke from his coma.

"You will remember, won't you, Ray? What you loved, what you do, what you value? You'll decide? You'll come back?" Like him, as he had always reacted under emotional stress, she felt her eyes fill, and groped for her handkerchief again. "I missed you," she said. "All those years. I wanted you back."

Bodie was in the room, just inside the doorway. For such a big young man, he was swift and softfooted. "That's good to know," and he spoke as quietly as she had. "I'll remind him if he forgets. He loves you, you know. He'd be glad to have you back in his life. Me, I've done with my blood kin. They wouldn't ... spit on me if I were on fire. If I were the one lying here, even Ray wouldn't have been able to bring them."

"Poor lad," she said involuntarily.

He smirked like a naughty child. "Don't be too kind to me. I'll burst into tears and spoil my reputation."

He sat back down in the chair on the other side of Ray's bed. "See, Ray, your mum's lovely. Wake up for her."

He waited expectantly, but Ray didn't move. The silence stretched. Then his communication thing beeped. He rose at once and went out to the corridor.

It was HQ, a general callout. "Doyle's not awake yet," he protested. "Mrs Doyle's here."

"We can get her to her hotel one way or another, at the end of the day. I do not actually pay you to hold Doyle's hand. On your bike, boy."

And he hadn't even been holding Doyle's hand. He might never again. He grimaced and said "Yes, sir," sullenly.

He filled his eyes with Ray while he told Mrs Doyle that he had to go. Touched his wrist again. Then he left quickly, fearing he would not be able to force himself away otherwise.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ray dreams.

All Ray could see around him was grey, like the densest fog, though the graveyard air was clear. The red stains on his t-shirt caught at his eyes, the most vivid colour to be seen around him. He looked from side to side. Hadn't Bodie just been there? Talking nonsense. About footer ... and Sally? Motorbike racing ... that barking mad Widowmaker. No watching that, he couldn't bear to see it if Bodie flipped the bike on that hillside. Then the brawl in that scrappy wood. Bodie swinging that branch and catching Ray under the ribs. Prat. Ray pulled one of the gang off Bodie's back and almost gasped when he saw the hold Bodie had on King Billy. Ray knew what that meant. Bodie would kill the gang-leader out of hand--but there was Cowley with his gun right at Bodie's head, its muzzle on Bodie's temple. Ray knew what that meant too. He'd seen it once, the skull bursting like an eggshell. He closed his eyes. His mouth was shut as it always was in this graveyard but he still shouted as he had longed to do when it happened, "Bodie! No!"

Had it happened this time? Bodie was gone. So was King Billy and the wood. The hearse was back, and the coffin in it. Was it still his own? Bodie's? A-Squad members came up to pull it out but his mother rushed up and laid her hands on it. "I missed you," she said. "I wanted you back."

This time he answered. "You didn't act like it. I was with Aunt May, you knew that. She and Uncle Jimmy found me the barrow job. You never so much as walked past me or bought a peach. I was not your son any longer."

She said nothing. She was holding a newspaper and her face was gray with fear.

Ray had read the report. A newspaper mention of homosexuality was rare, even in the scandal sheets, but all the reporters were grasping at straws and hoping this new illness would blow over, or at least be safely limited to poofs and other outcasts.

He called, "Bo-diiiie!" as he often did on an op when the villains were shooting and Bodie might be wounded. There was no answer. He turned to look, and his old home street stretched before him, empty and gray but just as it had been. He lifted a hand and his cheek was full and firm as it had been when he was a child and lived at home.

He took a step and found himself not on the rough pavement but inside his parents' house. His mother was watching the telly, Coronation Street or some such programme. He passed her, saying "Oi, Mum," and went up the stairs. His old sports jersey was strewn across the bed, his field trainers upended on the floor. They were muddy, too. Ray didn't think he could pick them up. He hadn't touched anything in the graveyard. He had walked with Cowley ... hadn't he?

He thought he had been about fourteen or fifteen when he played rugger at school and had these shoes. But if he was back then ... he looked under the bed, and there was the Fizeek magazine. He didn't try to touch it. He turned and went back down the stairs.

"Mum?" he asked.

"Hush, Ray. My programme's on." He'd heard it so often that it made him grin. Then he lowered himself to the armchair, or tried to, but he didn't even dent the slipcovered cushion. He felt tipped forward and stood again.

The adverts were on, so he tried again. "Mum," he said.

"What is it?"

His mouth tasted sour. "You know, mum, I'm getting a big lad."

"Growing," and she grinned.

"I'm ... noticing people."

She looked puzzled.

"I'm ... _fancying_ people." He gulped. "Boys and girls."

"Noticing young ladies is perfectly normal."

"And boys," he insisted. She frowned.

:"What, like a, a poofter?"

He remembered that at fourteen, even at sixteen, he hadn't really known what it meant, except that the bully-boys at school used it. In conjunction with shoving, tripping and pounding.

But "No," he said defensively.

Her facial expression didn't change. She didn't say anything.

It frightened him. " _Mum._ "

She braced herself. "Tell me more."

He shuffled his feet, looked everywhere but at her face. "When we go out to run," he said hesitantly. "Some boys ... just move like silk. Smooth, like a yearling training for a race. Like a hawk in the air. Just. Beautiful."

"Yes," she said. "But it's wrong. Boys together."

She didn't look angry. It didn't seem as if she were throwing him out or saying he was not her son. "Girls are beautiful too," he said, "and some of them look sideways at me like they're interested too."

"I'm sure they do." She smiled a little. Then the adverts were over and she shushed him.

He stood a moment looking at her, younger and happier than he'd last seen her, and then he darted over and kissed her on the cheek. "Love you, Mum."

"Go on with you." She waved him away."

He went out the front door and was back in the graveyard. He heard a gunshot and called, "Bodie! _Bodie!"_


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bodie comes back from the call-out.

Bodie turned up suddenly, as was evidently his wont, leaning at the doorway despite a sling over one shoulder. 

"What happened?" Mrs Doyle exclaimed.

"A villain with a gun got too sick. Wanker took out a slice of my arm. Doctor says a few days, if it don't get infected."

Ray was motionless as ever, but the heart monitor started beeping more loudly and quickly. The usual nurse, and then another, rushed in and rubbernecked at the EKG and the heart monitor. The first nurse patted Ray's arm and said, "It's all right, Mr Doyle. Everything's OK. Mr Bodie's here. He's fine too."

"Tall, dark, and beautiful as always." But Bodie sank to his knees beside the bed and took Ray's hand in both of his. The sling caught at his arm but he shrugged out of it to bring his hands together. "Guess you _are_ listening," he said with a little whoop of emotion and put his head down on the clasped fingers. The monitors calmed down and the nurses consulted in low voices, made notes in the chart, and then left. Bodie did not raise his head. "Goldilocks," he muttered.

Mrs Doyle asked, "Pardon?"

"Oh," said Bodie, his face about an inch over Ray's skin now. "It's a joke nickname. When we're on observation, somebody whom Cowley wants information on, it can last days. Ray sleeps in the back seat. Sleeps hard. So I call him Goldilocks. Cowley does too, sometimes." Ray stirred restlessly. Bodie watched, stroking Ray's hand. "Come on, Ray, you've got to do it for yourself!" He swiped one side of his face against their clasped hands, and then the other, but when he raised his head, the long dark lashes were clumped, starry with moisture. He looked only at Ray.

Mrs Doyle was too surprised to remain silent. "You love him."

Then he did look at her, almost startled. He began to speak but stopped and swallowed before he said, "More than my life. And I wasn't there when that Chinese bird shot him."

"I didn't know," she said.

He shrugged. "Why should you?" He took Ray's hand and laid it flat against the bandage on his arm. "This is what happens when I work alone," he said. "Hear me, Ray? Murphy's OK, but he's not you. Come on, Ray, open those green eyes of yours. We're waiting for you."

And Ray's head did stir on the pillow, turning until the tube in his mouth pulled. "Ray!" Bodie cried. "Ray! Come on, come back!" In a few steps, he was leaning out the door and waving. The nurses rushed in and swarmed around. One pulled up Ray's right eyelid and shone a little torch into it. Ray made a sound in his throat. The skin of his eyelids twitched. "Come on, Ray," Bodie muttered.

Ray's eyelids fluttered, and opened. He looked confused. "Welcome back," said the nurse, smiling. "Tell us who you are, what date it is. It's confusing, waking up, but we'll help."

"Me mum threw me out," he said. "I don't know where to go." His eyes filled with tears. "Is the bus coming?"

Bodie recaptured his hand. "You don't need the bus. I'm Bodie, remember me?"

"Bodie," Ray said hesitantly. His fingers tightened.

"I'm your partner at work," Bodie said. "I'm your mate." He smiled.

"Yeah?" Ray's smile was hesitant. "I have a job?"

"We do. We're the best team in CI5. You can rest now. You can ask me anything you want to know."

Ray paused a moment, holding Bodie's hand. "Bodie?"

"Yes, Ray."

"Why ... do I want to kiss you? Is that wrong?"

"No. It's fine with me. Now, luv?"

Ray looked around the room, at the nurses and at his mother. He licked his lips. "My mouth tastes bad."

"Would you like some water?" asked one of the nurses. Ray nodded, and she held a glass for him. "Now, you'll probably go to sleep again," she told him. "That's quite normal. Doctor will come and see you as soon as he can. Don't worry, Mr Doyle. You'll be fine, and we'll all help you." The nurses left.

Bodie bent over the bed and stroked Ray's face. He fingered Ray's lips and kissed him gently. "I can't tell you how happy I am that you're back with us," he said. His smile was wide and joyous, and he ran his index finger around Ray's mouth again. "Rest, Goldilocks, and if you drift off, remember I'm waiting for you. All right?"

"And if I forget, you'll help me remember," Ray said with quiet satisfaction.

"That's right. That's completely right." Bodie ruffled Ray's hair, his fingers withdrawing only reluctantly. "I suppose you'll want to stay a bit, Mrs Doyle?"

"A little, thank you." She looked at her watch. "Give me fifteen minutes?"

"Surely." Bodie drew his sling back over his bandaged arm, smiled at Ray again, and left the room.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ray sleeps and wakes.

Ray slept late the next day, or perhaps he slipped in and out of coma. He seemed disoriented. Bodie reassured him.

"I'm not in the graveyard," he said at one point. "I'm ... cleaned up."

"Course," Bodie said.

"Was it a dream?"

"Yes. The hospital room, here, this is the real thing. The graveyard was a dream."

"And the pub? Where you said I wasn't cool?"

"When you wear your sheepskin jacket, you're the coolest, Daddy-o." Bodie giggled. "Teddy-boy."

"You have ... poncy suits."

"I like to look smart."

"I like to feel comfortable. Don't I?" Ray looked anxious about it.

"You say so. I think your jeans are two sizes too small. And your shirts come from Oxfam."

Ray frowned. "Do they?"

"Look like it. I don't go with you, Sunshine. You buy your very own togs."

"When you weren't in school uniform, you wore jeans," Mrs Doyle put in.

"Were they too small? Patched?" Bodie sounded concerned.

"I patched a good few. Mostly he outgrew them when they only came to his ankles."

"Flood pants," Bodie said, nodding as if it were obvious.

"Hey, it's not as noticeable if the hems are torn." Ray turned his face away, disdainful.

Bodie beamed. "You go on thinking that," he said, the joking tone imperfectly concealing how happy he was to be having any conversation with Ray.

"Did you eat breakfast?" Bodie asked.

"'S rubbish, this food," Ray said, grimacing. 

"The most important meal of the day," Bodie almost sang. "I'll go get some. What d'you want?"

"Bacon butty?"

Bodie grinned even wider. "Coming right up," he said, then leaned over and ruffled Ray's hair.

"Gerroff!" But Bodie just smiled again as he went out the door.

"Clown." The affection was plain in Ray's voice.

His mother agreed that Bodie clowned about, though it was endearing, really. They weren't anything, together, that she had expected. She had met that couple of bachelors who lived at the corner, with their fuzzy little dogs and their pastel shirts and fussy manners. Neither her Ray nor Bodie were at all like that. Bodie looked more like a footballer, and Ray like a runner, racing in silk colours: yellow like daffodils and blue like the sky on a clear day. "How are you feeling, really?" she asked after a few minutes.

"Tired, like I've run the obstacle course. Sleepy, foggy, as if I'm not really here." He rubbed his bandage, absently.

"Don't," she said, as she had always stopped him from picking at scabs and sticking-plasters.

He smiled, slowly, and said, "Ah, mum, I'm glad you're here."

"I'm glad your Mr Cowley sent your Bodie to bring me."

Now his smile was blinding. "I wanted you two to meet," he said. "You like him, yeah?"

She shrugged. "He's a charmer, he is. Right fond of you, too."

"I think he is." Now Ray's smile was quiet, confident.

"When your father and I were walking out," she said, struck by the aptness of the memory, "I said something like that to May, and she said, 'what will it take to make you certain? Him on his knees in the cow-field with the Koh-I-Noor diamond and a string quartet?'"

He laughed outright, a clear peal she hadn't heard since he was a child. "I'm certain." Then he pleated the sheet, looking down at the cloth, and said, "I love him, mum. If I could marry him, I would. He's like bedrock, and he makes me laugh. He saves me life. Even when he keeps me in the dark, drives me round the twist, but I know he's protecting me. He yells at Cowley, disobeys orders ... "

"Sounds like that's a dangerous game."

"His favourite kind." He swallowed so hard that she could hear it. "Terrifies me, really."

Bodie bounced in the door like a brand-new football, a takeaway bag in his hand that smelled savoury and rich. "Don't say I never gave you anything," he said to Ray. "I've been dying to get into this since I picked it up."

"Gannet," Ray said, smiling up as Bodie beamed down.

Some rearrangement was required so that Ray could eat. He ended up with pillows stuffed behind him and on either side. Bodie ate half a sandwich while Ray tried to wave him off. Paper serviettes were everywhere to wipe the brown sauce off Ray's face and hands. "Can't take you anywhere," Bodie told Ray with a twinkle.

"Not till they discharge me, anyway." Ray glanced up from under his lashes. 

"Take you to your flat the minute they do." Bodie met Ray's eyes for a long moment. Colour rose in Ray's cheeks. Bodie's mouth gradually widened into a smile. Ray smiled back, and suddenly they were obviously in love.

Mrs Doyle felt, surprisingly, pleased. She remembered Father Sam saying that homosexuality was an evil perversion, nothing but lust and abuse.

It didn't look like that. Ray looked at Bodie the way Jim used to look at May, the way Ray's father Keith used to look at her. The way a good husband looks at a girlfriend or a wife.

Mrs Doyle had always promised herself that she would never be one of those sad mothers-in-law who acted jealous or hostile to their children's spouses. Why would a parent make her child's marriage unhappy? She thought of the awful day when she caught Ray with that dirty magazine. The sight had made the rage sweep over her like an enormous wave, like the whole Channel crashing down over her head. It was only when she had chased Ray out of the house and seen him run down the street with his half-closed duffel that she burst into tears and sank onto the loveseat. 

May phoned to tell her that Ray had turned up and she had taken him in. Hearing his name had been so painful, she had told her sister not to call again about him, and until that day he'd turned up at her door, damaged and rough-looking, she had avoided thinking about him as much as she could. But he had a habit of coming to mind, each time like a chest pain that might have been a heart attack. She'd sit down and talk herself round. Until next time.

Then last Christmas Eve, he'd come round with Bodie and bags of food and decorations and lights, like a prodigal son with ... well, she supposed Bodie might not have been his lover then. The shine in their eyes, the playful behavior, the smiles, were no different now. If not lovers, they had loved each other last year as much as this year.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ross and Mrs Doyle discuss the lads.

The next couple of weeks were hard on Ray. He was alone more than he had been since his coma. Mrs Doyle couldn't stay the whole time, but Bodie ferried her back and forth when she could visit. Ray started physical therapy and visits by the hospital counselor and even by CI5's Dr Ross. A woman! Young, as well, and Bodie at least teased her unmercifully. You'd never know, when she was present, that he was in love with her Ray. Meanwhile, as the days passed, Mrs Doyle grew more and more used to their relationship, until it seemed quite ordinary.

Once, when Ray was walking slowly down the corridor, with one of Bodie's arms round him and the other bracing the nearer elbow, Mrs Doyle said to Dr Ross, "What do you think ... what is your opinion of ... the way Bodie and Ray are with each other?"

Dr Ross's look was sharp, and it took her a few moments to speak. "As a working partnership, well, I'd call them too close. I've spoken to Mr Cowley about it. But he paired them together, and he's pleased with their successes, so he won't hear a word against the two of them. Every quarter, when I assess them, I record my concerns in the notes. But in terms of Mr Doyle's recovery, right now, Mr Bodie takes care of him, keeps him going, watches him like a hawk, and keeps his spirits up. I don't think they could do without each other."

"That's what I think too," Mrs Doyle found herself saying. "So if Mr Cowley ... finds out, he won't shoot them?"

Dr Ross took a swift inward breath but did not answer for a moment. Then she said simply, "No."

"But the people they chase, observe, whatever, they might have guns."

"Yes."

"Bodie said," Mrs Doyle told her, "Bodie said they could die any day they work."

"That's true," Dr Ross admitted.

After a moment or two, Mrs Doyle confessed, "I'm afraid."

"Very sensible," Dr Ross replied. "I must admit, the longer I work at CI5, the less I understand how they all go on. I see them joking, clowning about, playing practical jokes, pranks, and I see how close they are to each other, partners and fellow agents. How Mr Cowley ... he worries over them, shouts at them, tells them that he owns them body and soul. He's like a father to some of them. Bodie, for one. Not Doyle, though."

"He was very close to his own father," Mrs Doyle said.

"It still hurts him to talk about him," Dr Ross said. "I did find that out, even though both of them, Doyle and Bodie, are more inclined to flirt and joke than to participate in therapy. Most of the male agents are like that, and I don't push too hard. But I worry about Doyle's reactions to sudden stress now. Will he freeze? Will he overreact to danger, shoot too fast himself? If he fails Bodie ... I don't know how he will bear it."

"No," said Mrs Doyle, "I don't think he could."

"I assess agents who work singly, like Murphy, or Susan Fisher," Ross went on, "and partners like Doyle and Bodie, or Lucas and McCabe. Mr Cowley prefers partnerships, so CI5 has more partnered agents than single ones. But none of the others are like Bodie and Doyle. They hardly seem to need to speak. They move together like a single creature, except that time that Bodie was planning how to kill the motorbike gang-leader."

Mrs Doyle thought of speaking and then stopped herself. It seemed wrong to expose Ray ... but it also seemed wrong to conceal what he felt for his partner. " _If I could marry him, I would_ ," he had said. And Bodie had said he loved Ray " _More than my life_."

Finally, she said, "They love each other so much," with a mixture of shame, fear, and pride.

"Yes," Dr Ross said, and then fell silent.

Bodie brought Ray back and helped him get settled in the hospital bed. He went out again, though probably no farther than the hospital gift shop, for a pack of cards and a Mylar balloon with a cascade of rust-coloured curly ribbon at the top. Her ruffled the ribbon as he did Ray's hair, and Ray smiled.

Bodie arranged Ray's over-bed table and one of the visitors' chairs, and they played several games of cards: Wit and Reason, Speed, and Gin Rummy. Mrs Doyle began to see what Dr Ross had been getting at about how well the partners knew each other and how they didn't even need to speak. The cards nearly flew. Ray had asked Mrs Doyle if she wanted to join them, but she had demurred, and was glad afterwards because she knew she would have slowed them down.

They didn't play for money, just crowed in triumph when they won. Bodie stood up to play Speed, leaning intently over the table and slapping the cards down forcefully. It did give him an advantage as Ray was reaching from a half-reclined position. But they soon changed games at Bodie's suggestion, as if he were concerned at the effort Ray was making. Bodie and Mrs Doyle left earlier that day, and Ray yawned as they said goodbye.

"Careful, Goldilocks," Bodie said tenderly. "Physio tomorrow. Eat dinner, keep up your strength. It'll be Macklin and Towser before you know it."

Ray groaned. "Just shoot me again now."

"Nope," Bodie answered, "Counting on you, mate."

Mrs Doyle kissed Ray's forehead. "Sleep well," she said. "I'll see you Thursday, all right?"

Ray groaned theatrically. "Leaving me to be mauled tomorrow all alone?" Then he grinned. "Give my love to the girls at work, yeah?"

"I will," she promised. They left. When they were driving on the motorway, she asked, "Who are those people, Mack Lynn and, what was it, Towser? Sounds like a dog's name."

Bodie's teeth glinted in the winter headlights and the road lights over the motorway. "CI5 trainers. We have two main ones, Macklin for physical training, and Towser's his assistant. Rough, he is. Both of them are. If Towser were a dog, he'd be one of those black Alsatians, you know? All teeth. The other trainer is for scenarios, so we know how to handle situations like clearing a building, rescuing hostages, all sorts. More mental, you see. Jack Craine. We'll have a refresher with him too, and Ross will reassess us, all before we're back on the streets together."

"It'll be a while, then." 

"I'll have to work alone a while," Bodie said as though thinking it through. "Maybe an undercover. Those are usually single-agent ops."

Mrs Doyle remembered Bodie joking about the crease on his arm. " _This is what happens when I work alone_." She realised that she would worry about Bodie too, now. "But more dangerous," she guessed.

Bodie shrugged. "Some are, some aren't. The most dangerous ops for me have involved people I knew before I joined CI5. Doyle--Ray--is our undercover star. Cowley usually gives me fairly easy ones. Doesn't want me to screw up and end up in pieces all over Greater London."

"No, don't do that." Mrs Doyle watched raindrops begin to spatter the windscreen. "Ray will worry about you."

Bodie grinned for a moment. "I worry about him enough. I suppose it's his turn now."

"Be careful, Bodie," she said when they were on Litchurch street. "Till Thursday."

He half-saluted, repeated,"Thursday," and left.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Everybody knows they're in love."

A new young man arrived on Thursday to take Mrs Doyle to London. He was another tall, muscular lad with a mop of brown hair and merry eyes. "I'm Murphy," he explained. "Bodie's on duty, so Mr Cowley sent me."

"Is Bodie all right?" Mrs Doyle asked anxiously.

"Oh, he's fine. It's a gun-smuggling job, just the kind of thing he likes."

The morning air was chill. Mrs Doyle's shoulders moved in something between a shudder and a shrug. After a moment, Murphy said, "Really and truly, Mrs Doyle. We've been watching these men for two weeks. We know their names and their cars and the lorry they use. Even if we don't round them all up today, the coppers can pick them up, no fear. Bodie is our gun expert, so he'll be cataloguing the arms in the cell's storage for most of the day. Safe as houses. Anyway, he won't do anything too reckless with Doyle in hospital."

Mrs Doyle shook her head, speechless.

Eventually, she said, "Bodie mentioned you."

Murphy grimaced. "He would. I was backing him up when he got that crease." He gave a crack of laughter. "You know, when Doyle is there, Bodie keeps an eye on him, keeps him back. I've seen Doyle about to fly off the handle a half-dozen times, and Bodie hauled him off or held him back, calmed him right down. Bodie ... it's as if he doesn't dare let himself be impatient or reckless when he needs to protect Doyle."

"But when Ray isn't there?"

"Depends on why. If Doyle is missing or wounded, well, stand well back and don't get in the way. If he's just on another assignment, don't let Bodie have his head, or he'll just behave as if he thinks he's Superman. He'll half kill himself to get through the op and get to wherever Doyle is."

Mrs Doyle said to herself, "And now. This is unusual. There's nothing Bodie can do."

"I'm sure he'll think of something. I'll keep an eye on him. It won't end well for me if Bodie gets hurt."

"Will it help to remind Bodie about Ray?" 

Murphy shrugged. "I'll try it. Can't do harm, I don't suppose."

"I hope not." Mrs Doyle remembered Bodie telling Ray that Murphy was okay but not Ray. "Are you good friends with Ray and Bodie?"

"As good as anyone is. They're --" Murphy looked at Mrs Doyle out of the corner of his eye--"wrapped up in each other, really."

 _Everyone knows they're in love_ , Mrs Doyle thought. And none of them seemed to mind much.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness."

Mrs Doyle didn't want to think that Murphy would lie to her.

But when Bodie arrived at the hospital at last, that evening, he did not look like a man who had spent most of the day cataloguing guns. He looked exhausted, and without any visibly discoloured skin, he seemed bruised, beaten.

"You look terrible," Ray said, smiling gently.

"Yeah, you too," Bodie answered.

Ray did look low. The physiotherapy had really taken it out of him. He lay on his side, facing the door, and even Bodie's arrival did not make him sit up. 

Bodie sat on the edge of the bed and rested one big hand on Ray's shoulder. They sat without speaking for about a minute. "How are you feeling?" Bodie asked at last.

Ray shrugged; at least Mrs Doyle thought that was the gesture he meant. "Wrung out like a face-flannel. Op go okay?"

Bodie looked to one side. "Not bad," he said unconvincingly.

"How's your arm?" Ray pressed him.

"Sore."

Ray paused a moment, as if he were choosing not to say what he was thinking. "Lie in tomorrow?"

"'Till eight. Then HQ to finish the report. I'll be fine. Hey, who's the sick one right now? Lay off, mother bear."

Ray looked from under his eyelashes until Mrs Doyle swore the colour in both their cheeks had risen. "Still priapismic," Ray said softly. Bodie's mouth primped in a smile.

"Never did look that up. What's it mean, hungry? If I were a wild animal, I'd be gnawing off my own leg. I'll hit the Indian takeaway near mine, on me way."

"Just thinkin' of it makes me mouth water," Ray complained.

Bodie patted Ray's hip, reaching a little. "Never mind, Sunshine. I'll pick up your favourites when I take you home."

Mrs Doyle's eyes filled with tears. She groped for her handkerchief.

"Mum?"

"Mrs Doyle, what's the matter?" Bodie asked at once.

"No, it's nothing, it's silly." She blew her nose slightly. "When you were born, Ray, the doctor thought you were too small, so they kept us in hospital for a week. It was a bleak January, the wind thumping the windows, and I longed to be home and for it to be spring. Your father arranged--well, not a party, really, but Jim and May came over. She made Hot Cross buns. She knew I had always loved them. And Keith filled the house with flowers--chrysanths in vases and hyacinths in a ceramic pot--smelled like heaven. He stuck a sprig of baby's breath from the flower bunch in your hair. The nursing sisters had gone on and on about it, plenty of hair and so curly. It was like early Valentines. Keith was so proud of you, Ray." She sniffed again.

"Then," Ray said, his voice heavy with sorrow. Bodie put his arm around Ray's shoulders as if he could not help it.

"You are the best man I know," Bodie said forcefully. "The best, Ray. If your father were here now, he had better be proud."

"Or you'd thump him?" Ray looked wryly amused.

"Nah, I don't thump men older than you. I'd just let him watch until he noticed what you're like."

As they had done with her, Mrs Doyle thought. And it had worked.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At last Ray goes home.

Eventually, the day they had all been waiting for arrived. Dr Seigel pronounced himself satisfied, and Ray was discharged from the hospital. Mrs Doyle saw them home, along with copious amounts of Indian takeaway, and though Bodie ate most of it while they sat at Ray's kitchen table, Mrs Doyle tried several dishes that she had never heard of before, and Ray tried at least a little out of all of the containers while Bodie reminded him when they had last had the dish and what Ray had said about it. Ray did still look easily tired, and he was pale, but Bodie was positively glowing with delight and feeding Ray bits of curry and tandoori and naan.

Murphy was sent to take Mrs Doyle back to Derby. She found herself unusually sentimental as the time grew short, and as she was saying goodbye, she surprised herself by catching Bodie into a tight hug. "Come for Christmas again this year. OK? Put my tree up again. I'll make a turkey, all right? Take care of my boy and bring him home for Christmas." Then she turned to Ray and cupped his dented face in her hands. "Take care of each other. Remember I'm in Derby missing you. All right? Come back and see me."

Hearing her voice shake, she left in a hurry and pulled out her handkerchief when she was in Murphy's car.

"I'm glad you could come," he said as he drove. "You did Doyle good. You did _Bodie_ good. They're lucky to have each other, but Doyle is twice as lucky to have you."

She sobbed in the car for a good third of the trip.

When she had gone, Bodie cleared away the dishes and takeaway containers, got Ray settled on the sofa, and brought him tea and digestive biscuits. Then he sat beside Ray and gathered him into Bodie's arms, close against his chest. He breathed a great sigh. "I've wanted to hold you since I found you on the rug. Half killed me not... I couldn't hardly touch you." He nuzzled in Ray's hair. "You smell like hospital, but still like your hair, like your skin. Thank god. I felt like I was starving for it."

"Come to bed, Sunshine. Get your fill of me."

"Never that," Bodie said as if it were a vow. Folding Ray's two hands into his own, he kissed them before pulling Ray to his feet and going with him into the bedroom. 

Much later, in the dark, Ray spoke. "I wish I could bring back your parents for you, the way you brought my mum to me."

"No," Bodie said simply. "You brought yourself back. That's enough. All I could ask for."

Ray paused a while, then said, "Perennial as the grass. Common and fragile and indestructible. That's us."

Bodie kissed him, unable to find words.


End file.
